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Thursday, June 5, 2014

The ITA announced the list of Division I All-Americans today, with 50 men and 41 women receiving the honors in either singles or doubles or both. The list is not complete until the final rankings are released, because making the Top 20 in the season's last rankings is one of the three criteria for the award (being seeded for the NCAA individual tournament and reaching the third round of the NCAAs are the other two). With so many upsets in the men's singles tournament, there were bound to be more than the usual number this year. Last year, there were 45 All-Americans in men's tennis.

Only 14 players--seven men and seven women--were All-Americans in both singles and doubles in 2014. They are:

For the complete list, see the ITA release. Lists for the other divisions and for past years can be found here.

The women's Kickoff Weekend draft was completed today, and as I noted yesterday, participation was down, particularly compared to the men. In addition to the teams I mentioned yesterday, these teams also declined to play in the preliminary round before the ITA Team Indoor Championships when their turn came to choose a site: Oklahoma, Illinois, Arkansas, Brigham Young and North Carolina State. The tournament host this year is again the University of Virginia. To see the regional groups, see the ITA hub page.

The mixed doubles championship match was played at the French Open today, and former UCLA Bruin Jean-Julien Rojer collected his first slam title, partnering German Anna-Lena Groenefeld to defeat No. 8 seeds Nenad Zimonjic of Serbia and Julia Goerges of Germany 4-6, 6-2, 10-7. The 32-year-old Rojer, who was an All-American at UCLA in singles and doubles in 2001 and in doubles in 2002, was playing in his first slam final, although he has long been one of the world's top doubles players. He is a native of Curacao, representing the Netherlands in tennis. For more on their title, which came in their first time playing together, see this AP story.

Doubles is where the US junior success was today at Roland Garros as well, with Stefan Kozlov falling in the quarterfinals of singles, but he, CiCi Bellis and Tornado Alicia Black reached the semifinals in doubles with wins today.

Kozlov, the No. 6 seed, lost to his doubles partner Andrey Rublev of Russia 7-5, 3-6, 6-4. Kozlov had a set point at 5-4 40-30 in the opening set, but lost the next three points and dropped his next service game as well. After winning the second set quickly by the standards of the two-and-a-half-hour match, Kozlov was broken early in the third set and couldn't get the break back. (For more on this match, see Peter Bodo's coverage at tennis.com). Rublev, the No. 4 seed, will play No. 2 seed Orlando Luz of Brazil, who beat Johan Sebastien Tatlot of France 7-5, 5-7, 6-4. France does have a home hope however, with No. 5 seed Quentin Halys through to the semifinals. Halys beat qualifier Seong-Chan Hong of Korea 7-5, 6-4 and will meet No. 7 seed Jaume Munar Clar of Spain, who has not lost a set en route to the semifinals, cruising past Marcelo Zormann of Brazil 6-1, 6-2 today.

Kozlov and Rublev have been similarly dominant in doubles, with the top seeds dropping exactly five games in their three victories, including a 6-4, 6-1 win over No. 8 seeds Pedro Martinez Portero and Munar Clar today. They will play unseeded Halys and Benjamin Bonzi in Friday's semifinals.

The girls semifinals feature top seeds Ivana Jorovic of Serbia against No. 10 seed Francoise Abanda of Canada and No. 8 seed Darya Kasatkina of Russia against unseeded Marketa Vondrousova of the Czech Republic. For more on the singles, see the ITF junior website article.

In the girls doubles, Vondrousova and CiCi Bellis, the No. 7 seeds, continued to blow through opponents, and have lost only nine games in three matches. They will play unseeded Luisa Steffani of Brazil and Renata Zarazua of Mexico in the semifinals. No. 4 seeds Naiktha Bains of Australia and Tornado Alicia Black also had no difficulty today, losing only three games in their quarterfinal match. They will play unseeded Ioana Ducu and Ioana Rosca of Romania in Friday's semifinals.